, 1887-07-12
INGENIOUS MECHANICAL roYs.
Puppets Thn wero Almost Human
Wonderful Coutrivurees.

are now Principally dealt IN, also 20 back
10 o remote period. Vulcan's tripod on
wheels has the authority of Homer;
DnIalus made moving statute; Archytas
of Tarcntum. 400 b. c., invented n
wooden pigeon that could fly in the air.
In the Fifteenth century RcgiomanLamuB
made an iron fly that moved through the
atmosphere, and afterward an automatic
eagle, which, on the arrival of the En-
perur Macmillan at Nuremberg, flew
forth to meet him. Albertus Magnus is
credited with constructing a head that
moved and talked, and which so fright
encd Thomas Aquinas that he smashed it
into pieces, Albertus exclaiming when he
saw his achievement destroyed, per-
ishes the work of thirty years. Roger
Bacon made n speaking head of brass,
which excited awe among all who heard
it. Speaking automata have been fire.
quently attempted of late years, but the
great difficulty lies in stimulating the hui
man voice. The most successful of these
efforts was perhaps that of Professor
FabCr, of Vienna, exhibited in LOndon
forty years ago under the name of Eu-
phonia. Faber worked twenty-five years
at the automaton. The figure enumerated
words and also sang. There was an ar
rangcment of hollow pipes, pedals and
h'Nos ~ nv 10 pa ~ ~
''prompt the discourse"
Nillars de Hanecort, in the Thirteenth
century, constructed an angel that
would always point with his finger to
the sun The Marquis of Worcester
made IN artificial horse that would carry
n rider as swiftly as if he were n genuine
barb. Philip Camuz invented a wonder
full group of automata for Louis NIN-a
coach and four horses, that started off
with a crack of n whip, the horses pranc-
ing, trotting and ~galloping in turn; it ran
along until it got in front of the king,
when it stopped, when a toy footman de-
scended and opening the carriage door
handed out a lady ''with born grace"
The lady made n courtesy, presented a pc
tition to his majesty, and re-entering her
carriage was driven away. Gen. De
Gennes, a Frenchman, who defended the
colony of st. Christopher against the
English about 1858, amused himself by
making an autonaton peacock, which
walked about in all its pride of extended
feathers, and picking up corn from the
ground swallowed it.
The king of automata constructors was
Jacques Vaucanson, born at Grenoble in
1909. While quite a boy he made sew
eral self moving figures. The bent of
his mind was determined by a rather pc
culiar circumstance Being left to him
self in the house of a friend TO which lie
went with his mother, he perceived
through the crack of a partition an old
clock with slowly swinging pendulum,
which excited his attention. Next time
he visited this house he had a pencil and
paper with him, and made a rough
sketch of the clock. By earnest study
and investigation he succeeded in MAX
ing q clock of his own out of pieces of
wood, and his wooden clock kept time
fairly well. Then began his experiments
with automatic. He made a wooden
chapel, with moving figures of priests.
He invented a hydraulic machine for the
city of Lyons, and later, in the same
place, perfected n machine for silk weav-
ing that caused the work people to rise
against him in arms. His first great
achievement in automatic was his flute
player, which was one of the wonders of
his time. He had been i'll, and made it
during his convalescence. The several
parts Of it We're made by different work
men to prevent its discovery. Only n
faithful servant aided him in his secret.
According to D'Alembert, the remark
able figure stood on a pedestal, in which
a portion of the mechanism was con.
N'tA''N tAllNA AAAV BAttN 'A N.Y. OAAN bA'N AlAND
the instrument, but with its lips increased
or diminished the sound, performing the
lcgato and stacCato passages with perfcc-
ton, and lingering with complete acCu-
racy. 1t was exhibited in Paris in 1913,
and made a great sensation. Naucanson
next made a flagGolet player, n later a
mechanical duck, which waddled, swan,
Owed and uuacked, and, like De Gennes'
peacock, picking up and swallowing its
food. He was engaged on an endless
chain when he died. He willed all his
automata to the king.
Maetzel, the inventor of the metro
nome and of several musical automata,
opened an exhibition in Vienna in 1909,
with q life size automaton trumpeter as
the chief attraction. When the audience
entered all they saw was q tent. After
n time the curtain parted, and Maetzel
appeared leading forward q trumpeter in
the full regimentals of an Austrian
dragon. By pressing the left epaulet
of the figure he made it play cavalry
calls and a march, and an allegro by
Weigl, accompanied by a full band of
living musicians. Nor was this all. The
figure retired and ~reappeared as n trum-
peter of the French guard. Maetzel
wound it up on the left hip, pressed once
more on the left epaulet, and it played
the French cavalry calls, a French cav
airy march, a march by Dussek and one
Of Plcycl's allegros, the full band again
accompanying.
Kuauss again exhibited at Vienna an
automaton hat wrote, and the Drozes,
father and son, constructed several me-
ChaniCal figures that both wrote and
played musical instruments. A panto-
mime in five acts was performed by n
troupe of puppets in Paris in 1929, and
Blenfalt, in TAG, got up a representation
Of THE Bombardment of Antwerp by
automatic. Another piece performed by
Blcufalt's automata, which he called
comcdiens practiciens, was 1.-THE Grand
Assault Of Berg-op-Zoom "-''Romance
of Invention
Til, Austrian Canital,s Pnor